A Study in Ascension
by extraterrestrialAnchovy
Summary: Prince and Knight. Death and Resurrection. Friends and Lovers. Sherlock and John. A tale of how the fledgling consulting detective and the to-be army doctor ascends as Mind and Heart. For 'landofwholockandstuff' on tumblr as a part of the johnlockchallenges gift exchange, prompt was 'God-Tiers'. Teenlock, Johnlock, SBURB Session AU. Bonus Moriarty. T for death and snogging.


A/N: I'm finally done! This is my fill for the johnlockchallenges gift exchange on tumblr. The prompt I received was 'God-Tiers', and it was from the lovely 'landofwholockandstuff'! I didn't use your headcanon god-tiers though, sorry. Forgive me?

I know you didn't want angst, but it gets fluffy towards the end. I promise!

Beta'd by my lovely gillfrond, Pyro.

Italic letters are flashbacks. So non-italic letters are the present and the italic letters are the past.

* * *

Sherlock Holmes raised the gun slowly and pointed it at his best friend.

John Watson sat cross-legged on his Quest Bed, eyes closed and hands wrapped around his ankles.

"Whenever you're ready," he said softly. His voice was steady; there was a ridiculous brightness to it. Sherlock immediately knew that John was faking, and his grip tightened. Reaching God-Tier seemed like a horrible test. It was all rather stupid, exchanging one's life for immortality. For a brief moment, uncertainty flickered in the brilliant mind. Uncertainty scared Sherlock; if he wasn't certain, who could be?

Silence hung thickly in the air for a few seconds before John snapped his eyes open.

"What, you're going to hog those ridiculous breeches for yourself?" he snorted. Sherlock managed a weak smile. Even more ridiculous than gaining God-Tier were the costumes that come with it. Killing yourself plus terrible fashion choices? Was invincibility really worth it? Sherlock pondered this fleetingly. Perhaps he could have been a big prick and pranced about in his normal clothes while laughing at everyone else's silly, tasteless hoodies. Oh well, too late. Now he's stuck in this uncomfortably embarrassing Prince of Mind get-up.

John uncrossed his legs and stretched them out straight before him. He studied his trainers intensely. Sherlock cleared his throat.

"Alright. Well, whatever you do, don't panic-"

"Shit, I forgot my towel."

"John, I'm trying to be serious here. Just remain calm and it'll all be over in a few minutes."

"Sherlock, you're the one whose hands are shaking."

Sherlock sighed, defeated, and steadied himself. John adjusted his shoelaces for the last time and lied back onto the stony slab.

"Whenever you're ready." he repeated again.

Sherlock's mind screamed at him infinite ways that this could go wrong. _What if this isn't how it's supposed to happen? What if John doesn't come back to life? What if the circumstances are always the same? The game was cruel and subversive. What did it want from them? _

"Ahem," came a rather pointed cough from the Quest Bed.

He stored the thoughts away for now and focused on John again. With a somewhat determined set to his eyes, he let out a shaky breath, and pulled the trigger.

There was a bang, and then everything grew sickeningly quiet. Even the sweeping gales paused momentarily, as if it knew what had just happened. Everything stopped for a splinter of a second, to mourn the death of a hero.

John Watson's body became very still.

Sherlock stared at the blood seeping through his friend's rather iconic jumpers, before tearing his gaze away. He pulled out a can of bright yellow spray-paint, crouched, and scribbled some words on the cement ground.

_Be back soon._

_-SH_

He stood up again and crossed his arms, then raised his eyes towards the inky void of the Incipisphere. Somewhere out there was his planet, and he was going to pay it a little visit.

He really needed to alchemize a better outfit.

The winds picked up again as the plump hedgehog consorts started forming a crowd. They whispered in hushed tones among themselves in a language lost far in time.

* * *

_John Watson listened in silent horror as his best friend calmly explained the plan. _

"_Is there an option that doesn't involve anyone dying?"_

_"No."_

_John bit his lip._

"_I'll come back to you," the voice promised. _

_"We still have time to find your Quest Bed." John looked desperately around him. It would have been easier if Sherlock's planet wasn't an _exact replica of Earth_. The familiar streets of London swirled around him. It was eerily empty, save for the occasional otter-like consort that scurries out and then disappears again. _

"_No, no we don't. John, listen to me. Moriarty's on Derse this second. What he's up to can't be good. I reckon he's killing everyone's dream-self. I still can't wake up on Derse when I fall asleep. I've lost contact with Irene's dream-self. Mycroft won't answer my texts either. This is the only option."_

"_What if he killed himself to throw you off track? What if it wasn't even him who took the bullet?"_

"_Moran was pretty desperate to get to that corpse and- John, stop sniggering, that's why he's alive. Moriarty's alive because Moran kissed him. Moran's a sniper, not an actor."_

"_Does that mean I have to kiss you?!"_

"_Strange, I thought you would be enthused."_

_John flushed, "I'm not gay, okay?"_

"_John, your sexuality can wait." Sherlock replied, a little snappier than usual. John winced inwardly. _

_"Still, I'm going to have to kiss my best friend's corpse! Don't expect me to play the prince to your Snow White. Actually, _you're_ supposed to be the prince."_

"_Oh, just stop whining, why don't you. Look, get to St. Bart's, and hurry."_

"_Are you absolutely serio-" John began to say, but was suddenly met with repeated beeps. He brought the phone away from his ear and looked down at it. _

_Sherlock had hung up. Although Sherlock was impatient with how slow he seems to think everyone else's minds worked, he's never ditched him like this before. John stared at the phone sourly. _

"_Oh, what the hell," he hissed to a group of gathering otters in vain. They immediately scattered, leaving him alone._

* * *

The lights on the Land of Sand and Warfare were so blinding that Dersites could have surely seen it. Jim Moriarty sniggered as he balanced precariously on top of one of the tall obsidian spires. He hummed a little tune to himself as he uncaptchalogued his phone. This little tune happened to be _Eensy Weensy Spider _and he continued it on a loop as he began typing out a word of congratulations.

Hey. 3  
-JM

I see your little soldier had risen up.  
-JM

That sure adds a new meaning to burning the 'heart' out of you, no?  
-JM

Don't pretend you didn't know it already.  
-SH

Ohdear, he saw through it again. :C  
-JM

Sherly, dear, you're just so serious all the time.  
-JM

Maybe when I take away everyone you love you'll finally learn to take a break?  
-JM

Without waiting, he chucked his phone back in his sylladex again and rubbed his face. With a sudden jerk, he brought his arms in front of him and made a face. _Orange is such a sickening colour_, he decided spitefully, _I hate the costume designers. Heck, I hope there's a complaint option somewhere. _

Jim Moriarty looked at Skaia again. From Derse, it was just a tiny, insignificant speck of light.

He stood on tip-toes, stretched his arms, and grinned.

His phone buzzed again. He ignored it.

There were planets to blow up, people to kill, things to thieve, shit to wreck.

And besides, talking to angels was boring.

* * *

_John Watson watched helplessly as his best friend toppled from the hospital roof. He tried to tell himself that this wasn't real, that he had to believe Sherlock, that Sherlock would come back to him safe and sound grinning like a stupid idiot, or a mad genius. He was both. _

_But there no matter how many times he braced himself for the impact, it sliced through his defences effortlessly. The scene was too painful to look at. Sherlock's pale face was streaked with scarlet, his dark curls sticky with blood, his eyes glassy and half-lidded. Despite the fact that Sherlock had patiently walked through every single step (which, in fact, weren't very many) with him, he felt helpless. _

_John stood there for what seemed like infinity. His entire body was numb and he just stared and stared and stared. He couldn't grasp the reality of what he was seeing; all of his senses abandoned him instantly. Sherlock, Sherlock Holmes, dead? The cold, harsh truth of everything left him dumbfounded. After a while, his brain suddenly clicked and a floodgate of thoughts opened. His senses lurched confusedly and a museum of emotions exploded. There was panic, distress, grief, anger, and it all melted into a mess of signals that tore through his body. _

_He screamed Sherlock's name at a heart-shattering volume, dashed forward, tripped, scraped his knees, and just stayed there on the cold pavement. His throat was tight; there was something warm running down his face. For a second he thought he was bleeding, but when he reached a hand to his cheeks gingerly he found it to be tears. He wiped them away hurriedly with his sleeves, choked back a sob, and let out a long shaky breath. He dragged himself in an undignified fashion over to Sherlock's body. _

_It was limp, terrifyingly limp with no trace of a pulse. It sprawled there with a sickening stillness. John felt dizzy and turned a little green. _

_Then he remembered that there was a plan._

"_Right," he said aloud to no-one in particular, "Right, a plan."_

_Gently, John lifted Sherlock's upper body so that he was half-cradling and half-supporting it. He grabbed a hanky, cleaned Sherlock's face up as best as he could, and tossed the mangled piece of cloth over his shoulder. He leaned over the body and shivered violently, he was feeling nauseous again. _

_John took a breath to calm himself. _

_Slowly, he met Sherlock's lips with his. _

_He could feel that Sherlock was losing his body heat rapidly. He could taste the rusty traces of blood. Everything felt wrong, completely and utterly wrong, and the ever-heterosexual John Watson never paused to consider the current situation of him kissing his very-clearly-same-gendered best friend. The most mind-paining thing is that he was kissing his very-clearly-dead best friend. It wasn't supposed to be like this, he was supposed to be kissing a happy, alive, somewhat smug, and rather arrogant Sherlock. _

_John broke away, a little embarrassed at his last thought. His thoughts prattled on furiously as he clutched onto the body with a blank expression on his face. _What does kissing a corpse do anyways? _He looked back at Sherlock's face and felt for a pulse again. There still wasn't anything._

_John's face turned deathly pale. _

Oh God. I've done something wrong, haven't I? Sherlock's dead forever now. He's never going to wake up. I failed him, I must've missed something. What do I do? Do I keep playing this game?

"_Damn the game!" he cried out to no-one in particular. Panic was starting to cave in on his chest as his eyes flickered over the scene before him. The otters were watching him with beady eyes from the corners of buildings and the curb of the pavement. _

"_Are you alright, John?"_

_John almost fell over as he scrambled up and pulled out a pistol. He pointed it blindly around him while covering his mouth with the other hand to fight the wave of nausea building up inside him._

"_John, put that down! It's just me!"And it was; it was just her. Molly Hooper had been staring at him for the past five minutes from the entrance of St. Bart's. John blinked at her before collapsing onto his knees again._

"_Molly, I think I'm gonna be sick."_

_"I won't watch," she turned her back on John as he retched. _

"_Shit, I don't have my kerchief."_

_"That's why you should always bring towels," her tone had a sharp edge to it as she offered him one, he accepted it and wiped his face down and kneeled there, panting. A nasty scent began to mingle with the smell of blood._

"_Sorry about that," he apologised sheepishly, "Er… How long have you been standing there?"_

"_You were screaming Sherlock's name, right? So I came down as quickly as I could from inside the building and then I saw you snogging him-"_

_"It's not what it looks like…?"_

_"It's not?"_

_"Is it? Wait, sorry, I'm not feeling too well," John leaned back on his feet. After a few moments of recollecting his thoughts, he spoke again._

"_Well, Sherlock said that there was this plan thing for me to follow, so I was like 'okay', but he said that it involved throwing himself of f a building. I didn't feel too good about that, so I protested, but he said that it was the only way. So he did that, and here I am, and I'm supposed to kiss him because…because that supposed to resurrect his dream-self on Derse. Yeah, that's it," John's face suddenly lit up at the thought that he might not have failed after all._

"So he asked you to kiss him?"

_The situation suddenly clicked. He just told Molly, Sherlock's number one fan and assistant, that Sherlock asked him to kiss his dead body. Molly was in St. Bart's at that time, Sherlock could've just asked her to do him a favour instead. Heck, she's got a raging crush on him and wants to work in a morgue, why the hell wouldn't he ask her?_

_Molly looked away from him and bit her lip. She closed her eyes quietly. They stood there in an uncomfortable silence before suddenly swiveled around to meet him with piercing eyes._

"_Take care of him, will you?" she asked, and John could hear the hurt in her voice. "Sherlock Holmes needs someone to take care of him. He doesn't think I'm good enough, so please, make sure he doesn't make a stupid mistake."_

He already did_, John thought to himself, but he didn't say anything. He wanted to comfort Molly so badly, to tell her that it wasn't like that. But she could be a tad stubborn, and there were times when she wouldn't listen to a single thing you said. He nodded instead._

_Molly sighed. _

"_Alright, well. See you later, John."_

_"Yeah, see you. Thanks for letting me borrow your towel."_

_Molly managed a smile._

_"You can keep it, I've got the code."_

_Without waiting for a reply, she turned and walked down the street. _

_It was then that the ever-heterosexual John Watson felt not-so-heterosexual anymore. For a brief moment, he had desperately wanted to know what it would be like to kiss an alive person, to kiss an alive _Sherlock_. The thought had somehow managed to nudge its way into his to-do list and absolutely refused to go away. John flushed under his collar and rubbed his face. _

_It had begun to rain._

_It always rained in London._

* * *

"Nice coat," John Watson raised an eyebrow. Sherlock Holmes was standing in front of him, and apparently very much alive. He only hoped that Sherlock will stay that way.

"Nice cape," Sherlock replied warmly. You couldn't really tell if he was being real-warm or fake-warm. It made John want to strangle him, "A very manly choice of colour."

"Shut up," John grumbled as he tried on his hood. It was ridiculously small and was a shade of even darker pink than his shirt, "Where did your tights go? We could have been a royal Knight-Prince duo thing."

"Don't be silly, those tights sucked," Sherlock said matter-of-factly, "You should alchemize another one of your adorable little jumpers with the Heart logo and colour scheme, like I did with my coat.

"I wouldn't keep the colour scheme if I had the choice." they started drifting through Sherlock's planet, the Land of Mist and Memories. John shifted the topic away from his ridiculous uniform.

"So… Did I resurrect or something?"

"Actually, no. Your death in a very special location had forced you to wake up as your dream-self, which then underwent a transformation that granted you supernatural powers and limited immortality."

John nodded slowly.

"So… What happened to my other body?"

"It's still lying out there, on the Bed."

"Oh," everything went quiet for a moment before John inhaled and spoke up again.

"So, uh, Molly was at St. Bart's when you phoned me," he began awkwardly, "Why didn't you just ask her to, y'know, help you with the plan? I mean, she was much closer, uh, physically of course. She would've saved much more time."

Sherlock looked at the sky.

"It was an experiment," he said simply.

"For what?" John immediately demanded.

Sherlock mumbled something incoherent.

"Tell me, I won't be mad," John quivered.

"Ijustwantedtoseeifyouwouldki ssme," Sherlock said sharply.

They both stopped in mid-air. Sherlock glared at the horizon, arms crossed, a slow flush rising to his cheeks. John opened his mouth to stay something, closed it, and then burst out laughing.

"You could've just asked," he chuckled as Sherlock whipped around and stared at him. John hopped in front of Sherlock.

"Relax," he said gently as he grabbed Sherlock wrists and forced the taller boy to uncross his arms. He couldn't help smirking when he felt the pulse pounding rapidly, "Hands go here," he placed Sherlock's hands on his waist. Sherlock froze as John stood as tall as he could and took Sherlock's face in his hands.

"You're blushing really badly," John commented.

"Shut up," Sherlock whispered. John grinned triumphantly before pressing their lips together.

The kiss was warm, warmer than the one on the streets filled with cold and despair and fear. This one was overflowing with joy and hope and love and the promise of being there for eternity and forever.

They pulled apart moments later, gasping for air and flushed with heat.

"Hey," John murmured dazedly as he looked into Sherlock's eyes. Sherlock's blue-grey eyes that had never been filled with so much wonder and surprise and happiness until now.

"Hey," he started again a little giddily.

"You alright?" Sherlock asked.

"Yeah," John swallowed, "There's something I have to show you," he planted a chaste kiss on Sherlock's lips before pulling away. He entwined Sherlock's fingers in his and grinned again. Sherlock still looked a little uncertain and dizzy.

"Is this real?" he asked a little stupidly.

"Yes, you idiot," John smiled and pulled Sherlock along with him, "Come on."

* * *

_The core of Derse was pitch black. The torch that Sherlock had brought shone feebly in the darkness as the unknown devoured its rays. He slipped through the air smoothly, looking for something._

"_Heeeeeeeeey," a voice called out towards his right, nearly causing him to drop the torch. He swore silently as he quickly pointed the light towards the direction the voice came from._

"_Over heeeere, sweetie," it came from the above this time, "Or maybe heeeeere?" this time, the left. Sherlock dropped the hand that was holding the torch and tensed. He flicked the switch, the light went off. _

_He was completely swallowed by a void of nothingness. _

"_Thank you," the voice purred from behind his ear, leaving goosebumps on his neck. A hand gently eased the torch from him. Sherlock let it go. A moment later, Jim Moriarty's floating face suddenly appeared in front of him, grinning._

"_Hello again," he said, holding the torch under his chin to light his features from below, causing what would have been a spooky apparition if it hadn't been Sherlock. Sherlock rolled his eyes. _

"_That trick's for children."_

_"We _are _children, Sherlock. Don't pretend you're all grown-up. Enjoy life while you're still young."  
"You're not here to kill me."_

_"No, I'm not," Jim smiled, "Unlike you, I'm not boring."_

_In a swift stroke of the arm, he pointed the torch at their feet. _

_Two levitating stone platforms; one teal, the other orange. Jim strolled casually to the centre of the orange one, stepping into the middle of a painted yellow sun. _

"_I want you to know you've come so close…"_

_He pulled out a gun and grinned. _

"_But yet you're still so far…"_

_He chucked the torch at Sherlock, who instinctively caught it. Without pausing for a second, Jim pointed the end of the gun into his mouth._

"_Wait, no-"_

_The bang was loud, but the silence that followed was deafening. Sherlock stood there, trembling. After a few moments, light began to gather around where Jim was moments ago; a bright, golden light. He could see the mess of blood and the hand that curled limply around the gun. Taking a leap forward, he untangled the fingers that was holding the gun and snatched it up, then drifted back to his own stone platform. _

_It was a teal colour._

_In the centre, painted with a much brighter teal, was a circle. The circle had three wavy lines extending from it, the lines were evenly spaced. _

_Sherlock Holmes looked one last time at the inky darkness of Derse. _

_He raised the gun to the side of his head._

* * *

"Here we are," John clutched Sherlock's hand as they landed on yet another London street. They took a walk along the pavement, as if they were just best friends on a normal weekend afternoon and not two of the last humans to ever exist.

"After you jumped off the hospital roof and everything, I just explored a bit," John continued, absent-mindedly eyeing the little trinkets on display in the windows of shops; shops with no keepers, items with no buyers. The thought itself was eerie.

"I found your Quest Bed," they stared their reflections as they passed a large glassy pane that gave them a view into a cafe. There were even smudges and fingerprints on the window. An unfinished cup of coffee lied on a table with a used napkin; there were no customers, and there will be no waiters to clean it up.

"It was in this apartment. This is the only door in the whole entire city that was unlocked," John nodded towards the door, "Everything's properly furnished inside. There's two bedrooms upstairs, your Quest Bed's in one of them."

It was a rather ordinary door, made out of wood and painted black. Some of the paint was peeling though. The brass doorknob and knocker were also slightly tarnished.

"Does it look familiar to you?" John asked.

"No," Sherlock breathed, a small sensation of comfort suddenly crept into his chest, "But it feels like…"

"Home?" John offered.

Sherlock nodded very slightly.

"Yeah, home, a place where I belong…"

"That's what it feels like to me too." John sighed happily.

Sherlock looked at the letters above the knocker:  
_221B_

Then he glanced down the street. On the corner was a sign post. It read:  
_Baker St_

"Has a nice ring to it," he remarked.  
"What does?" John asked.  
"221B," Sherlock turned the handle gently, "221B Baker Street."

They stepped into the hallway, and Sherlock closed the door slowly behind them.

* * *

**_END_**


End file.
